Madison Region, Wisconsin
Advance Now: Madison Region's Strategy for Economic Growth
Thrive is the economic development organization serving the Madison Region, comprised of Columbia, Dane, Dodge, Green, Iowa, Jefferson, Rock, and Sauk counties and inclusive of both the Madison and Janesville metropolitan statistical areas. Thrive was recognized in 2011 as the best economic development organization in the state by Corporate Report Wisconsin. The four-year old organization is well-positioned to ramp up the region’s competitive qualities and establish the Madison Region as a leading job creation engine and a highly livable community with a world-class business infrastructure.
Market Street Services is partnering with Thrive to coordinate Advance Now, a strategic planning process that will systematically move the Madison Region’s economy forward.
Advance Now will unite fragmented economic development efforts with a comprehensive action-oriented strategy that will enable the eight-county region to compete on a larger scale in today’s global marketplace.
The Advance Now process, to be carried out in two research phases and two action phases, will create a holistic, transformational economic development strategy that builds on the Madison Region’s specific assets and a tangible implementation plan that will guide strategic efforts and outcomes. At the end of the eight-month long effort, Thrive and its partners will have a defined consensus of the region’s potential and a prioritized set of actions necessary to achieve that vision. The Advance Now Strategy will also enable the Madison Region to obtain designation as an Economic Development District from the federal Economic Development Administration.
Led by an engaged Strategy Committee of regional leaders from a wide representation of backgrounds, the Advance Now process is intended to create an actionable strategy that will not sit on the shelf. The final outcome of this four-phase process will be a detailed program of work for Thrive’s leadership and professional staff to leverage new opportunities that concurrently strengthen the region’s business climate, create new jobs with competitive wages, and preserve and enhance quality of life across the region.
Phase I. Competitive Assessment & Stakeholder Input
The Competitive Assessment will provide a detailed look at the eight-county Thrive region’s demographic, socioeconomic, and economic trends in recent years compared to the metro areas of Austin, Texas; Des Moines, Iowa; and Lincoln, Nebraska as well as the state of Wisconsin and the nation. The realities of the regional economy, well-being of residents, and growth and development of the community will be examined.
Additionally, a series of focus groups and one-on-one interviews will be conducted with key stakeholders from throughout the Thrive Region to complement the quantitative findings of the Competitive Assessment. This input will directly inform the recommendations of the five-year strategy.
Phase II. Target Cluster Analysis and Marketing Review
The Target Cluster Analysis will draw on Phase I research and input to provide a look at the Madison Region’s economy that goes beyond traditional measures of current and potential future economic activity. Due to its entrepreneurial spirit, the location of a major research university, and its long history of agricultural and food innovation, the Madison regional economy has many distinctive drivers that must be considered and leveraged in the analysis of its economic structure. The end result will be a well-refined list of business clusters that will highlight the most important existing and the most promising emerging targets for Madison’s regional leaders to pursue.
The Marketing Review component of this phase will assess the Madison Region’s image among national site location professionals and identify best practice economic development marketing programs across the country.
Phase III. Advance Now Strategy
The Advance Now Strategy will serve as a tool unifying Thrive and its regional partners across the eight counties behind a consensus blueprint for economic development in the region. Developed in collaboration with the Thrive staff and driven by the volunteer leadership of the Strategy Committee, the final Strategy will be a detailed and visionary game plan of goals, objectives, and actions to achieve over a five-year period.
Phase IV. Implementation Plan
If the Madison Region’s Advance Now Strategy determines the “what” of the eight-county Thrive Region’s preferred future, then the Implementation Plan answers the “how.” The Implementation Plan is a playbook that guides the launch of Advance Now and drives its ongoing momentum through the five years of implementation. It will provide capacity assessments, measurement tools, a plans for years one through five, and other information necessary to successfully implement the Advance Now Strategy across Thrive’s public- and private-sector partners in the eight-county region.
For more information, visit Thrive’s Advance Now website.